On the Death of Friends
by Loki's Scribe
Summary: Sirius looked back at the book. "Sleep's not in the charts," he mumbled. Remus put a hand on Sirius's knee and squeezed a little, drawing Sirius's eye from the page back to him. "This isn't about the research," he accused.  Sirius/Remus


_Characters not mine._

_(Originally written for a first line challenge on comment_fic - the prompt gave me the first line, and I continued from there.)_

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"You seem to be cultivating an eating disorder."

Sirius looked up from the tome on his lap and put on his best scowl, which was always fairly impressive. Remus, however, had seen it a million times and didn't even blink. He just stood there, arms crossed over his chest and one eyebrow raised, waiting for the inevitable smart remark.

Sirius didn't feel up to making one, for once. The words were starting to go blurry on the page and his back ached from holding the same position so long. He was fairly certain the flower in the headboard had worked marks into his shoulder. "Am I, now?" he asked.

"Honestly, Sirius." Remus gathered up several of the bits of parchment Sirius had been keeping notes on into a stack and moved the mug of tea on the nightstand so he could put them where it had been. "When _was_ the last time you ate? And I mean a real meal, not a handful of something on the run," he said, sitting gingerly on the edge of the bed where the papers had been. "Or the last time you slept, for that matter."

"Recently enough," Sirius said.

Sirius might have a very impressive scowl, but Remus was the one with the remarkably expressive eyebrows. He raised one now, and in doing so informed Sirius that he didn't believe a word of it, that he did, in fact, know damn well that Sirius wasn't providing dates and times because he could no longer remember them, and that he was even less impressed with ole Padfoot's stubbornness than usual. He picked up three of the slimmer volumes at Sirius's feet and stacked them carefully, largest book first.

Sirius rescued his quill before Remus moved on to it and twirled it between his fingers. Remus set the books beside the mug and glowered at it for a moment. "Sirius," he said.

He shook his head. "I gotta get this done, Moony."

"I've barely seen you in the past two and a half days. Which means you haven't been down to the kitchen, and you've probably barely slept. I don't care if you're working on the cure for death, that's not healthy."

Sirius opened his mouth.

"The three days worth of beard on your face makes it kind of difficult to argue with me."

Sirius reached up to feel his cheeks and nearly put the quill in his eye. "Ow," he mumbled, silently cursing. It just gave Remus another thing to cite against him.

Remus reached forward and plucked the quill out of his hand. "Before you hurt yourself more."

"'M _fine_. Just a little uncoordinated."

Remus snorted. "You have a worse chance of getting me to believe that than I do of becoming Minister of Magic," he pointed out.

He rubbed the corner of his eye. It hadn't really _hurt_ at least; it was only a feather. "It was worth saying. And I'm finally getting somewhere."

Remus rolled his eyes. "There are sandwiches in the kitchen. And then you're going to get a few hours' nap, and it will all come together in your sleep because you're a bloody genius like that. And it'll be all I can do to get you into the shower before you go roaring over to Order Headquarters to jabber excitedly at the nearest Auror."

"Mmm." Sirius looked back at the book. If he concentrated, the old-style script was still readable and the sentences still mostly made sense. His notes had probably stopped being sensible hours before, but they had never been great in the first place. "Sleep's not in the charts," he mumbled.

Remus put a hand on Sirius's knee and squeezed a little, drawing Sirius's eye from the page back to him. "This isn't about the research," he accused.

"This _is_ important."

"You aren't like this unless something else is going on, and only then when James is too busy with the married thing to go out and get you smashed." Remus shook his head. "This isn't about Marlene McKinnon, is it?"

"Dammit, Remus." He hadn't wanted to be reminded of that. Loosing a friend was bad enough, but when Bellatrix had killed the girl right in front of him and he hadn't been able to stop her only made things worse.

But this was a _war_, it wasn't as though he expected to get through it unscathed.

Remus bit his lip. "Or Regulus?"

Sirius's breath hissed out from between his teeth. It was Remus. Sirius should have expected it - although not even James had said anything since the body had been found.

Remus met his gaze and didn't back down, though. Somehow, when things got truly dire, Remus never did, although he caved in an instant when things weren't.

"Can't take the blood out of my viens, I s'pose." Sirius reached up to rub his temples.

"I know," Remus whispered.

"He was trying to run, you know. From the way it happened."

Remus picked up one of the random pieces of parchment on the bed, put it into the tome on Sirius's lap, and closed the book. "I know," he said again, lifting it off of Sirius's lap and putting it on the floor.

Sirius bit his lip.

Remus scooted a little closer to Sirius on the bed, until they were hip to hip, and reached out to take his shoulder this time. "Sirius, you're exhausted far past the point of dreams just now."

"You weren't out, were you?" Sirius asked suddenly.

Remus shook his head.

He'd left Sirius alone in the bedroom for three days. That meant he'd been sleeping on the couch to give Sirius his space, and hadn't said a word about it. Yet another reason for Sirius to feel like an arse. "Sorry, Moony."

"'S'all right." Remus stood up and offered Sirius a hand. "Let's get some food in you, first."

Sirius tried to smile thanks and let Remus tug him to his feet, only stumbling a little on their way out of the bedroom as he reminded stiff muscles how to move.


End file.
